Worries To Carry Alone
by MyMagentaPeach
Summary: New York was supossed to bring happiness, and Blaine does not even know he is slipping into depression when it starts. Thankfully, Kurt has his own eyes to see, but that does not mean he can fix things. Can Burt help, who had suffered from depression himself after losing his wife all those years ago?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Glee.

**A/N:** I don't even know which corner of my psych this just crawled out off. But it did. Maybe because today I can finally let go again of pretending to be oh so strong. To get through study sessions and exams. I am finally catching a break, and apparently, and very reassuringly for me that means my mind is letting loose:) After all the trials of the last months of work I am still a writer at heart and mind and soul and really just all over. I can never be unhappy about that, ever.

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**Worries To Carry Alone**

It is not like Blaine has never had a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach before.

But this time feels different.

There are reasons instead of reason, it seems, and those have him worry. It is not a choice.

If he _had _a choice he would be happily dancing around the kitchen right now and bake cookies for Kurt. Because you can never bring enough happiness through baked goods to someone you love.

But that fear he cannot grasp is holding him down and won't let go. And there is not a thing in the world he can think of to do to make it go away, to make him not simply sink to the floor where he is standing right now, halfway between the kitchen and the door to the apartment, and still be there when however long later Kurt walks in.

"You won't believe the day I've ha...," Kurt sing songs, breaking off as soon as he spots Blaine just crumbled in on himself on the floor.

Blaine hears the thud of bags and maybe a jacket hitting the floor, an umbrella in the mix, definitely, and then he feels the heat of a body beside him, a hand warm on his cheek's skin, and a voice in his ear, soft but shaky, "What's wrong?"

Blaine huffs his next breath out in a sharp, frustrated way that Kurt knows, from his own dad, ... but Blaine does not.

"Hard time breathing?" Kurt asks. He had seen his dad fall into depression after his mom had died, had only fully registered that he knows the signs the second time around when Burt had almost broken it off with Carole, after Finn and the _faggy_-lamp incident, almost lost her too, and slipped for several days into a state close to this but in the end nowhere near.

Finding Blaine drifting in his own skin, it is no reassuring thought.

"Blaine? Sweety?"

Another huff, much less sharp.

"Please say something ... ."

"I don't know what's going on with me," he says it because it is the only thing he can feel right now, those worries weighing that hollowness inside him down, him with it. And there are no words for that.

Kurt spends the whole night holding Blaine ... in silence. Hoping there will be words tomorrow, maybe even answers.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **Yes, you got to me guys. I had not expected people to want more, especially since I just really wrote this totally selfishly for myself, but you did, so here it is.

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**Worries To Carry Alone**: Chapter 2

The next days, Blaine unravels inside.

Kurt can feel it with every hug, the man in his arms shaking in his skin, and trying to press it down, whatever it is that is rising in him.

"What's wrong with you?" it is a desperately angry hissing sound that Kurt can hear Blaine only weakly utter to himself that night as they lie in bed, every sound muffled by a pillow Blaine's face is resting on heavily, dead weight.

That is how Blaine feels. A dead weight in Kurt's arms, a dead weight in Kurt's life. 'Useless!'

Kurt has been lying more hours awake than asleep with Blaine these past nights.

Kurt always, ALWAYS the big spoon.

They are lying like this tonight too. And because Kurt has found out the past days that words are counterproductive with Blaine right now, have Blaine, clearly at a loss for words himself, feel even more isolated, Kurt strengthens his hold around Blaine in response to pretty much anything, strengthens it tonight to answer the muffled sounds.

The waiting that comes after is to Kurt the least bearable part.

When Blaine, eventually, quietly turns in his arms Blaine's eyes are wide and '... changed,' his lips are trembling, seconds later his cheeks are wet, and then ... Blaine is sobbing.

Any other day Kurt would hate to see his boyfriend like this, any, well, most other days tears being a sign of distress.

They are now too, Blaine is in pain.

Kurt knows though, Blaine has been in pain ALL this time – numbness, hollowness you cannot communicate a pain all of its own, deeper, darker, ... out of reach, unremovable.

Pain.

Those tears mean more though. They are a sign that Blaine is feeling _something _again.

Kurt does not push, does not pull.

There is no drying these tears tonight, "I love you," the words are warm and the hand coming to cup Blaine's cheek is soft. "I love you."

Kurt lies awake until the early morning hours, not once letting go of the man in his arms. His hold only easing once he slips into an all-consuming sleep of exhaustion.

Blaine is up before Kurt the next morning, busying himself with breakfast.

Still, Kurt takes off the day, and then another, from work and school, makes Blaine do the same.

And then he tries to make Blaine smile, tries to make him feel ... happy. With long walks and serenading him on the open street, with hot chocolate and kisses, with flowers and cheesecake.

With love.

They have made a promise to each other after all. To not back down again, from their problems, challenges, confusions – to not push each other away ... nor let go.

And it is hard to know when what is needed. Because in the end all they have to go on are their instincts, the things they have learned from past triumphs, the things they have learned from past mistakes, the things they have learned from loving each other.

Making changes, adapting to a new situation, a new challenge, that is not the hardest part, people say it is ... but that is not really true. The big problem are not the times you are busy with something new, the challenge are the times that lie in between, the times of waiting, of waiting for the changes to take effect, to make one feel ... new.

And so Kurt knows, whatever it is Blaine needs to find a way to do, to change, to find, he needs to be there for it, help Blaine through the moments when doubt creeps inside his mind, clouds everything, takes away too much.

Waiting. It is the hardest thing Kurt has ever learned to do well. To not get frustrated and lash out and widen the rift between himself and whoever he is waiting for.

Waiting for his mom to get better.

Waiting for his dad to smile again.

Waiting for someone who would want to touch him, hold his hand, hold all of him.

And then there is the nagging doubt that he is not doing enough at all. That holding Blaine and loving him and being here, and walks, and ice cream and singing are not the right thing to do. Not at all.

Kurt is not naive.

He knows.

He knows there is no pill or vaccine, one for all, like with the flu or a headache. Depression is tricky and can come and leave in the span of minutes, moments, seconds. Can outstay a person's everything. Destroy ... everything.

And so in the days to come, turning into weeks, he watches, and waits and takes care to take care of himself too, so Blaine will have no reason to blame himself for anything that is happening right now once they really talk about it all, and Kurt has still his hope that they will.

And then, two and a half weeks later, Kurt having watched Blaine try and pretend he is better, he is "... okay Kurt, I'm okay, I was just under the weather," Kurt calls his dad.

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A/N: Now you got me to get myself curious about what Burt would do. Oh well, I guess with the GIANT hiatus ahead of us I will have the time to write this too.


	3. Chapter 3

**Worries To Carry Alone: **Chapter 3

When it had first happened Burt had not known, could not possibly have known what Finn's comments would lead to.

But ..., when hours after Burt had asked Carole and Finn to leave Kurt had still remained locked away in his room Burt had gone to investigate.

He had found Kurt, after not getting any answer to his knocking carefully tiptoeing into the room, curled up asleep under the blankets that had been draped over the old couch before, to match the new colour scheme.

He had found something else too, the bright colour of the one blanket clutched balled up in Kurt's arms smudged dark.

It had taken Burt's thoughts a moment to gather and for him to realize _'...tears.' _

Before he had even had time to think about stopping himself, Burt had gently moved his left hand to rest on Kurt's upper arm, giving it a gentle squeeze.

It had taken a while for Kurt to stir, "Dad? What's wrong?"

Burt had not spent a second thinking about his own dishevelled appearance, eyes red-rimmed, clothes array, but of course Kurt would notice, "I'm okay, Kurt. How 'bout you?"

"'ve been better," Kurt had murmured, sinking a little deeper back into the blankets, wrapped all around him.

"Why were you cryin' earlier?" Burt had asked with only a moment's hesitation.

"Carole makes you happy, I don't want you to ..."

Burt had cut Kurt off with a soft press of lips to Kurt's forehead.

Kurt had been stunned into silence. The last time Burt had done this, Kurt had remembered then, ... _'I was nine.'_ "Dad?"

"Kurt," Burt had said with as serious an expression on his face as Kurt had ever seen it.

"Yeah?" Kurt's voice had been shaking with the simple sound.

"Remember our favourite song?" Kurt had nodded, so Burt had gone on, "You ARE the sunshine of my life. I mean that. I do."

Kurt had swallowed hard.

"Don't you ever forget that," Burt had added, placing another kiss to Kurt's sleep tousled hair this time.

Kurt had sat up then, as best he had been able to, still wrapped up in fabrics, and only a moment later Burt had had both his arms full of Kurt ... and the blankets. "Love you, Dad."

"Love you more, Kurt."

"Love you most."

They to this day have four dozen silly little rituals like that that are, neither silly, nor little to either of them.

When Burt had slipped, only days later, not having spoken to Carole at all since that day, into an isolating state of sadness it had hit Kurt with the suddenness of lightning, he had seen his dad like this before. Then he had not known what to call it, but he had felt it none the less, so strongly that the feeling had years later still been imprinted in his body, years later though, he suddenly had found himself with just the word, the thought, recognition, ... 'Depression.'

It had been a word still relatively new to his vocabulary, only about eleven months before had they read a story in his favourite class, English, because of Miss Nilsen rather than the daily subject matters, a short story about a girl living in a house full of ghosts, and only in the end, after Miss Nilsen had talked with them about it had Kurt understood 'They are not ghosts at all, her sister, her mom, her ...,' "Dad."

"Mmh?"

"Are you depressed?"

"Am I ... . How ...?" Burt had looked up, all those years ago now, expression not unlike Blaine's on the first day Kurt had found him on their apartment's floor, except for the frown full of confusion, but alike in his whole expression being tired, and pale in a way that is usual for Kurt, but not his father, nor Blaine.

Kurt had held out one of Miss Pillsbury's pamphlets. "So everything is dark? Let's find the light switch together," Burt had read out aloud, still frowning, probably more than before. Burt had been about to say something else ...

... when Kurt had cut him off, "I'm scared, Dad."

It is this pamphlet, from all those years ago that Burt is clutching now tightly, sitting in his seat a moment longer, passengers all around him already grabbing wildly for their carry-on luggage, before he too steps into the rapidly emptying aisle, pamphlet still firmly grasped in his left hand.

Coming to New York was always meant to be a happy occasion, over and over. This time Burt finds himself as scared as Kurt had been all those years ago holding out this pamphlet for his dad to take.

He could have just pushed it away, taken and torn and thrown it away.

And '... so could Blaine.'


End file.
